Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers

Last Edit: 02/05/17

Introduction

Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a nonprofit
corporation that is located in the United States of America. ICANN was founded
on the 18th of September, 1998; and currently has it's head quarters in Playa
Vista, Los Angeles, California. ICANN is responsible for managing two crucial
namespaces of the Internet: 1) Internet protocol namespace 2) Domain Name
System namespace. The most important department within ICANN is IANA: IANA
is the department that administers many of the technical responsibilities
of ICANN.

(Pictured: ICANN Office in California, United States)

ICANN plays a critical role in maintaining the stability of the Internet:
every computer on the Internet has an address which is either a number of
a name (IP or DNS) and it is ICANN who manages this address / namespace system.
ICANN's role is referred to as a 'backbone' service, ensuring that the Internet
maintains it's "smooth" functioning; without ICANN, or another organisations
performing the same role, the Internet would struggle to operate in a stable
and functional fashion.

ICANN was previously under contract to the United States Department of Commerce,
but on the 1st of October, 2016, ICANN was freed from U.S. government oversight
- ICANN will remain based in California. The U.S. government has used its
remaining influence upon the Internet to move full control of it's namespace
to ICANN, rather than to the UN or another International intergovernmental
organisation body. The Internet's namespace has therefore transitioned to
multi-stakeholder governance; rather than one governed by a single nation
state (U.S.).

History

ICANN was founded on the 13th of September, 1998, and it was founded, in-part,
due to a controversial incident involving Jon Postel - one of the pioneering
individuals involved in the development of the Internet. IANA had largely
been the sole fiefdom of Jon Postel from the 1970's to 1998, Postel yielded
immense authority upon the Internet - sometimes referred to as the "Internet
God" - due to his management of the Internet's underlying address book.
This sphere of operation being controlled by one person was not viewed as
a serious issue when the Internet was largely a research and educational network
project in the 1980's, but it would not continue to be viewed so.

Due to widespread dissatisfaction with Network Solutions monopolising the
registration process for domain names, on the 28th of January, 1998, Jon Postel
was involved in a 'test' which involved changing the root server that eight
root nameserver "pulled" addresses from; this involved changing
the root server from Network Solutions to IANA. Some critics have likened
this 'act' to a hijacking of the Internet. Postel was condemned by political
advisors to the U.S. president; there were alleged threats made to Postel
that he "would never work on the Internet again".

The result of Postel's independent action, aka "infrastructure test":
was that it led to the NTIA agency of the United States Department of Commerce
releasing a green paper that would lead to the creation of ICANN. The paper
was titled "Technical Management of Internet Names and Addresses"
and it's content was concerned with "improving technical management of
the Internet Domain Name System, as a proposed rule of the Department of Commerce."
The paper was published on the 20th of February, 1998.

The result of NTIA's green paper was that IANA became a department of ICANN,
and oversight for ICANN would be provided by NTIA; an agency of the United
States Department of Commerce. In effect, a muzzle was placed on Jon Postel
by the U.S. government, who would ensure that no single individual would ever
possess such an authoritarian role upon the Internet's infrastructure. That
said, while Jon Postel's act was controversial, his knowledge and contribution
to IANA was recognised, and he was set to become the first chief technology
officer of ICANN, but, he died in 1998 of heart complications, and Esther
Dyson took the job instead.

In 2006, the U.S. government renewed it's contract with ICANN and signed
a memorandum of understanding (MoU): a bilateral agreement further outlining
ICANN's role. While ICANN was responsible for assigning DNS registries and
registrars, it's memorandum with the U.S. DOC never resulted in it supplanting
IANA as the manager of the DNS root zone file. The United States Department
of Commerce (DOC) authority over ICANN and IANA was never a popular arrangement
internationally: with many 'calls' made by national governments and international
intergovernmental bodies issuing demands for ICANN's to be placed in 'the
hands' of an international organisation.

The Montevideo Statement on the Future of Internet Cooperation was released
in 2013 - in response to the NSA surveillance scandal (PRISM surveillance
program) - and the statement was signed by the heads of ICANN. This added
further pressure on the United States Department of Commerce (DOC) to find
a solution to their controversial oversight of ICANN. On the 1st of October,
2016, ICANN's contract with the United States Department of Commerce (DOC)
was ended, freeing ICANN to enter into a global multi-stakeholder arrangement.

Responsibilities
and Structure

While some commentators have likened ICANN to a government of the Internet,
in fact, ICANN's role is very limited (they say so themselves) in relation
to the Internet and it's role was outlined in it's Memorandum of Understanding
with the U.S. government. This memorandum is titled "MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING
BETWEEN THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE AND INTERNET CORPORATION FOR ASSIGNED
NAMES AND NUMBERS" and was signed by Joe Sims (Counsel to ICANN) and
J. Beckwith Burr (Associate Administrator, NTIA).

It should be clear that the memorandum highlights that ICANN is a corporation
whose purpose is only related to the IP and DNS namespace of the Internet.
ICANN has no responsibility in relation to the following Internet issues:
content control (web or otherwise), financial transactions, data protection,
spam (email, web or otherwise), gambling, or privacy.

ICANN is a non-profit corporation that has sixteen members on it's board
of directors. ICANN is comprised of advisory committees which help it set
policy; it's governmental committee is probably it's most important and is
respresented by over 105 nations. The current ICANN committes are:

At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC)

Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC)

Root Server System Advisory Committee (RSSAC)

Security and Stability Advisory Committee
(SSAC)

ICANN has also created a number of additional organisations to help set policy
and manage it's administrative responsibilities:

The Internet is comprised of computer networks that use the Internet protocol
suite. The core protocol within this suite is the Internet Protocol (IP).
The Internet Protocol (IP) routes packets of data across the Internet through
the use of IP addresses inserted into the packet headers. IP addresses (numerical
label) are assigned to every device that connects to a computer network that
uses the Internet protocol suite for communication. The Domain Name System
(DNS) is a naming system which uses alphanumeric strings to more easily locate
IP addresses. ICANN's technical responsibility is managing how unique IP addresses
are distributed and managing the Domain Name System (DNS).

Most of these technical responsibilities are administrated by the Internet
Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) - a department within ICANN - with ICANN
coordinating IANA's activities. In their own words, ICANN's technical responsibilities
are:

"coordination of the assignment of
technical protocol parameters including the management of the address and
routing parameter area (ARPA) top-level domain"

"the administration of certain responsibilities associated with Internet
DNS root zone management such as generic (gTLD) and country code (ccTLD) Top-Level
Domains"

"the allocation of Internet numbering resources"

"other services"

ICANN has also implemented some technical services: 1) Domain Name System
Security Extensions (DNSSEC): provides fraud protection 2) Uniform Domain
Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP): a policy that resolves domain name
disputes, such as trademark based domain name disputes.

Administrative

ICANN manages the Top Level Domain zone of the Domain Name System (DNS),
it does so by: setting policy, setting rules, creating new domains, assigning
domain registries and accrediting registrars to manage the registration of
domain names. Individuals can submit registrar complaints to ICANN, but ICANN
does not resolve individual disputes. ICANN also manages the InterNIC website,
which provides services like: WHOIS: search domain records and Accredited
Registrar Directory: search ICANN accredited registrars.